One God, seventy generations of silence.
The esoteric faith that closed its doors in 1043 and never reopened them: strict unitarian monotheism grown from Ismaili Shia Islam, reincarnation of souls within the community, and a division between the initiated uqqal and the juhhal who carry the faith by belonging. No conversion in, none out.
Why it is filed this way
The Druze descend from Ismaili Shia Islam and are carried on that branch of the tree. Whether they are Muslim is answered differently by Druze authorities, by Sunni and Shia authorities, and by the several states that have legislated on it. The descent is not in dispute; the membership is.
DeitiesThe One, beyond every attribute and image
Founded1017 CE · Cairo, then the Levant mountains
AfterlifeImmediate reincarnation within the Druze community
TextsThe Epistles of Wisdom — read by initiates only
The map
The Druze Faith’s corner of it — solid lines are descent; dotted lines are resemblance only, ideas held in common across unrelated faiths. Click a node to recenter; ✕ returns here. All 171 faiths →
610 CE Islam 632 CE Shia Islam 1017 CE The Druze Faith
God is One, beyond every description.
Tawhid taken to its limit: no attributes, no image, no anthropomorphism survives the Druze insistence on unity.
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Souls reincarnate within the community.
At death the soul passes instantly to a Druze newborn — the community is a closed circuit of souls, which is why no one joins and no one leaves.
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The wise carry the books; the rest carry the faith.
Uqqal and juhhal: initiation into the Epistles is optional and earned — belonging is not.
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T
The One.
Unity so strict that names themselves fall short — what the Epistles say further is for the initiated to know.
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The khalwa.
Thursday night in the plain hall of seclusion: the Epistles read among the initiated, the uninitiated at home keeping the ethics.
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